


cast thy nighted colour off

by inkycloak



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Christopher Marlowe faked his death, Codpieces, David Tennant is a character separate to Crowley and makes an appearance, Footnotes, Historical Inaccuracy, Historical References, Idiots in Love, Ineffable Husbands (Good Omens), Ineffable Idiots (Good Omens), M/M, Mutual Pining, Other, References to Hamlet, References to Shakespeare, Sharing a Bed, Vaping, aziraphale introduces England to the potato
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-30
Updated: 2019-07-30
Packaged: 2020-07-27 04:58:01
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,566
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20040301
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inkycloak/pseuds/inkycloak
Summary: The Globe Theatre, 1599. Aziraphale is jealous of Christopher Marlowe, and Crowley accidentally starts the Anti-Stratfordian movement. Four hundred years later they have tea and there’s only one bed.





	cast thy nighted colour off

_The Globe Theatre, London, 1599_

Crawly – no, Crowley – had kept his word. The theatre was packed, and the play was yet to start. Aziraphale winced as an emaciated bear chained to a pillar tore apart a bulldog. The crowds cheered as they were spattered with blood. He wondered if he should put a stop to it, but the Queen herself was expected to make an appearance, and bear-baiting was one of her favoured entertainments.

‘Quite the sssshow,’ hissed a voice. The demon appeared at Aziraphale’s side. He looked, as he always did, rather dashing – the fashions of the time suited him well, even in shades of his customary black. His jerkin was fine leather and he had eschewed a neck ruff in favour of an open collar. His silk hose were form-fitted and the outfit was completed with a rather daring codpiece that made the angel blush. [1]

‘You’ve done a marvellous job, I do say,’ Aziraphale admitted. ‘How did you manage it?’

Crowley grinned in that way of his. ‘Believe it or not, I have some influence with Her Majesty.’ He nodded towards the upper gallery, and indeed Aziraphale saw that the Queen was being helped into a seat by her ladies.

‘Oh, and I had assistance from a friend. He should be here soon –’

‘Crowley!’ exclaimed a voice. A handsome man, perhaps in his thirties, with longish dark hair and a sapphire dangling from one ear, had forced his way through the crowd and thrown an arm around the demon’s neck. He then kissed Crowley on both cheeks.

‘Something I picked up on The Continent.’

‘Not the only thing you picked up on The Continent,’ said Crowley. ‘Angel, this is my good friend, erm, Kit… Faustus.’

Aziraphale was not unintelligent, and kept his mind active by engaging in the literary arts. He’d had a hand in the invention of the printing press, and had his own misprint copy of the Gutenberg Bible, as well as a growing collection of Quartos by contemporary writers. These Quartos tended to have illustrated front pages, often including a portrait of the author in question. He therefore immediately recognised the man masquerading as ‘Kit Faustus’ as Christopher Marlowe: the playwright, the poet, and most importantly, the English spy who was supposed to have been stabbed to death in a bar six years previous.

It had been a messy business involving several dead Catholics, several more angry Protestants, and one spurned ex-lover, none of which Crowley had been involved in, but had received a commendation for nonetheless. He’d become friendly with Marlowe around the time when The Jew of Malta was written, and had helped him fake his assassination and escape to Venice, where the poet had been laying low for the last half decade.

Aziraphale held his protests, besides, the play was starting. He watched as two actors took the stage.

‘Who’s there?’

‘Nay, answer me. Stand and unfold yourself.’

‘Long live the king!’

Burbage seemed to be in better spirits in Act I, Scene ii, shedding real tears as he waxed poetic about his inky cloak and windy suspiration of forced breath.

‘Is that why you wear all black?’ Aziraphale whispered to Crowley.

‘What, because I have within me which passeth show? I hardly have a dead father to mourn.’

‘You know what I mean.’

‘I do not.’

‘You know. The rebellion. The battle proud in vain attempt against the Throne and Monarchy which raised impious War in Heaven. Your fall nine times the space that measures day and night into hideous ruin and combustion down to bottomless perdition there to dwell in adamantine chains and penal fire.’

Crowley stiffened.

‘I didn’t so much fall as –’

‘I know, I know, saunter vaguely downwards.’

Aziraphale regretted saying this immediately.

Crowley glared at him, and returned his attention to the stage.

‘My sartorial choices are none of your business,’ he muttered. Next to him, Marlowe raised his eyebrows.

Somewhere around Act III, Scene i, Aziraphale bought a baked potato from a vendor. Ten years ago, he’d returned from The Americas with Sir Walter Raleigh, and gently nudged him in the direction of bringing the root vegetable to Her Majesty. Sir Walter hadn’t had much enthusiasm for potatoes until the angel suggested that they might help him earn back the Queen’s favour, especially after that whole debacle with the embarrassing sonnets.

Crowley and Marlowe heckled Burbage mercilessly throughout his soliloquy.

‘To be or not to be –’

‘To be!’

‘Not to be!’

‘Whether ‘tis nobler in the mind to suffer –’

‘Sod nobler! Kill Claudio!’

‘Claudius.’

‘Right. Kill Claudius!’

‘The undiscovere’d country from whose bourne no traveller returns –’

‘I was there yesterday and managed to get back here fine. It’s a non-smoking area.’ [2]

Aziraphale picked at his baked potato. Crowley and Marlowe were getting along annoyingly well. Angels could sense love, and there was no shortage between the two. Contrary to what the Greeks had thought, there were no real distinctions between any particular varieties of love – eros, philia, ludus, agape, pragma, philautia – at least there was not any variety in what Aziraphale could sense, just that there was a great deal of it, and that it was the first time he’d picked up any such reading from the demon.

If he had been less tetchy, Aziraphale might have found joy in the realisation that Crowley was capable of love – something he had wondered about more than he’d care to admit – but at that moment, he was busy being irritated by Marlowe’s hand on Crowley’s shoulder.

Performing a miracle didn’t feel any different to tempting mortals to sin. All Crowley had to do was convince enough people to see a play that had quite a bit (perhaps too much) talking and not nearly enough cross-dressing. Like most people, he really did prefer the comedies – which was how he managed to pull off a full house overnight. By Act 4, the audience’s growing suspicions that The Tragicall Historie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark was not actually a comedy were confirmed. Nevertheless, the play was a success, and it was admittedly quite good, despite Shakespeare’s insistence on pushing the boundaries of language to the point of obscurity.

After the show, Marlowe bought them drinks at the pub across the road.

'I would never have thought Hamlet would be a hit,’ he remarked, quaffing ale. ‘Where’s Will? He should be around here somewhere. I bet he’s pleased.’

‘Rather remarkable linguistic innovation for someone with no university education, wasn’t it?’ said Aziraphale.

‘Oh, don’t be a snob,’ said Crowley. ‘Are you suggesting he stole the plays from someone else? The Earl of Oxford, perhaps?’

‘Of course not, that would be ridiculous.’

Marlowe frowned and went off to find Shakespeare, leaving Crowley alone with Aziraphale. The angel was quiet.

‘What’s wrong? Found the play a little depressing?’

‘I’m not sure you can trust him.’

‘What, Kit? He’s fine. Everyone thinks he’s dead. Besides, I’m a demon. You’re not supposed to trust me either.’

‘You’re right. How do I know this Arrangement of ours isn’t some bigger plan of yours to seduce me to do your whims and thwart Heaven?’

‘Why, do you feel seduced?’

Aziraphale flushed. ‘Absolutely not. You’re being ridiculous.’

‘So then, as per our Arrangement, you will go to Edinburgh and do both the miracles and the tempting.’

‘Yes, I will. Can’t trust you to go and do it properly, you’re a demon.’

‘Sounds fine to me.’

‘But you’ll get the next one.’

‘I’ll get the next one.’

_The Globe Theatre, London, 2019_

Crowley didn’t really eat unless he was with Aziraphale. Now that the angel was living with him, he had decided to learn to bake. The pie was cool enough to eat, so he cut a slice and brought it to the study with a cup of tea, where Aziraphale was using his computer.

‘Apple?’ [3]

Crowley grinned.

‘Oh, this is divine. Thank you, my dear.’

Aziraphale didn’t really sleep unless he was with Crowley. Despite his protests that ‘his side’ wouldn’t like it, he had agreed to stay in Crowley’s Soho apartment, at least on a temporary basis. It was beginning to sink in that perhaps he didn’t have a side anymore. Heaven had rejected him. He was no longer welcome. But it wasn’t like he had fallen, and his wings were still pure white. He had been left alone to live as he wished – no more heavenly obligations, no more duties to perform miracles – all he could do now, was essentially live as a human – and wasn’t that, deep down, what he had wanted? To read books and have picnics and spend time with his – his… Crowley?

The first few nights, he hadn’t slept at all, preferring to stay up and bid on rare books on eBay. Crowley had been sleeping rather a lot, and had made it clear that the bed was large enough for two. He had even Aziraphale purchased a pair of plaid pyjamas from Harrods, which the angel found touching.

The thing about the end of the world is that it makes you think about what’s important. What you’d miss. For Aziraphale, that was his bookstore, and his collection of books of prophecy and misprinted bibles, his signed Oscar Wilde first editions. Sushi. Oysters. Nutella and strawberry crepes. Tartan picnic blankets. For Crowley, that was Aziraphale (and perhaps the Bentley, which was gone in the same manner as A. Z. Fell & Co was gone).

But they had the rest of eternity to rebuild Aziraphale’s book collection, and Crowley was determined that he’d spend it enjoying life with his angel. The Globe was in a slightly different location than it had been four hundred years ago, since the old one had burned down, but it looked mostly the same. Instead of a black doublet, the actor playing Hamlet wore jeans and a t-shirt with muscles printed on the front. He was barefoot.

‘Do you remember the last time we did this?’ Crowley murmured in Aziraphale’s ear. It had been a week or so since Armagedidn’t and they had spent each day together dining at the Ritz, visiting old book shops, picnicking, at West End, going to flower markets, sampling bakeries. Crowley tried very hard to not think of it as courting, especially when Aziraphale gifted him with a potted Calathea at the Columbia Road Flower Markets.

‘Hmm, yes, 1599. Theatre was empty before you helped it along. Will was endlessly grateful.’

‘I did that for you.’

‘Yes, you did it so that I would take your Edinburgh job.’

‘No. Well yes. But I did it to show you that I am, well, capable of good. The tempting… all of that is just my job. Was my job now, I suppose, since Downstairs is no longer sending me messages.’

And he hadn’t felt freer since, well, ever.

‘Do you miss them?’ he asked Aziraphale.

‘Who, Heaven? Certainly not Gabriel, or Michael, or Uriel, or any of them. But although I may not be employed by Heaven anymore there’s no escaping the Almighty.’

‘Hm. What will you do now? Continue to perform miracles of your own accord?’

The angel seemed to think about this for a while.

‘I don’t think so,’ he replied. ‘The world can get along just as it is without either of us intervening in the Cosmic Game of Chess.’

The actor on stage held up a skull.

‘Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio: A fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy: he hath borne me on his back a thousand times; and now, how abhorred in his imagination it is! My gorge rims at it. Here hung those lips that I have kissed I know not how oft. Where be your gibes now? Your gambols? Your songs?’

‘What do you think of this fellow? Better than Burbage, isn’t he?’ Aziraphale asked.

‘Hm. It’s 2019. I thought we were done with generic white men playing Hamlet.’

‘Well, I think he’s rather handsome,’ said Aziraphale.

  
After the show had finished, Crowley drove them to The Savoy, where a table had conveniently just become available. The pianist was playing Thelonious Monk.

‘I can’t believe you accidentally started the Anti-Stratfordian movement.’

‘I received a commendation for it too.’

‘Of course you did.’

Crowley sipped at a cup of silver needle and was captivated as Aziraphale loaded his scones with jam and clotted cream, eating them with an expression of utter bliss.  
‘Angel,’ Crowley began. Now seemed a good time as ever.

Aziraphale licked cream off his fingers. ‘Yes, my dear?’

‘On the last day of the world, I said some things. Suggested we leave the earth and go off together to Alpha Centurai. Then when you declined, I said I’d leave and never think about you again. I apologise. I was being selfish. I was in a panic, and my instinct was to take what mattered most and leave everything else behind – ’

Crowley’s hand shook. He put down his cup of tea. Aziraphale covered his hand with his own. The fingers a little chubbier, the skin a little paler, nails perfectly manicured. He smiled at Crowley and the corners of his eyes crinkled.

‘My dear. Do you remember Christopher Marlowe?’

‘You met him in 1599 – the second time we saw Hamlet.’

‘Yes. Were you and he –?’

‘No! No, not like that. He might have… offered, a few times, but we never – no.’

‘I thought perhaps –’

‘No.’

‘It’s just that I’d always wondered if demons could love. And that day, there was something like that, between you.’

‘We were close friends. He was in trouble with the er, Pope, and I helped him out.’

‘But I was happy to know that you could love. I wasn’t sure, but we are made of the same stuff, after all.’

‘I can’t speak for the rest of Hell, but I don’t think your reading is, to say, erroneous. Maybe it’s just something I’ve picked up from being around humans for so long.’

There was silence for a few moments. Aziraphale refreshed his tea.

‘But you haven’t – but nothing like –?’

‘No, no. I’ve never –’

‘Never?’

‘No. Have you?’

‘No.’

Another silence.

‘So you can sense when there is a great deal of love about?’

‘Something like that, yes. As I’ve said, it’s like what you have with spookiness.’

‘What does it feel like?’

Aziraphale considered this for a moment.

‘Warm,’ he said, squeezing Crowley’s hand with his own.

That evening, as it neared midnight, Crowley lay in bed eyes half-closed, somewhere between wakefulness and sleep. Aziraphale came in through the open door and set down his mug of hot chocolate on the bedside. He was wearing the pyjamas.

‘Move over, my dear’ he said. Crowley scrambled to make room. Aziraphale arranged himself close and pulled the covers up. He was warm, and so soft. He wrapped an arm around Crowley and kissed him on the temple.

Footnotes

[1] Not all angels blush. In their corporeal forms, most have ichor instead of blood. Aziraphale, who was quite a bit more attached to his human body than he would like to admit, did have blood, and was therefore capable of blushing, among other things.

[2] Hell has been a non-smoking area since 4000 BC, however, as of 2013, vaping is not only permitted but compulsory.

[3] The pie, but also the computer. Crowley has his particular affinities.

***in this fic, Aziraphale's bookshop is not restored.


End file.
